


Girlfriend

by Ninkasa



Category: Doctor Who, The Sarah Jane Adventures
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-27
Updated: 2009-11-27
Packaged: 2017-10-03 20:45:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ninkasa/pseuds/Ninkasa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Luke needs a word defined.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Girlfriend

The definition the dictionary gave was "a favored female companion or  
sweetheart". This didn't relieve his confusion and actually only added  
to the difficulty he'd been having lately.

Maria had gotten so upset with Keith Stewart when he'd called her  
Luke's girlfriend. She'd actually started yelling at the other boy.  
"I'm not his girlfriend!"

And then later, Clyde had stopped someone else from commenting,  
declaring, "Luke has a girlfriend. And she could kill you with her  
mind."

He'd made the decision he should probably ask what the word actually  
meant, which was why he'd headed into the kitchen to talk to Alan.

Alan was sitting at the table, watching Sarah Jane bustle around the  
kitchen, neither of them noticed him hovering in the doorway.

"So, you're letting your fifteen year olds girlfriend stay the  
night." Alan said, Luke couldn't see his face, but he'd wager it was  
something like tasting a sour lemon.

And there was that word again. He didn't understand why everyone put  
such an emphasis on the word.

Sarah Jane shook her head before turning to look at Alan, raising an  
eyebrow at Luke as she did so.

"No. I'm letting my friend's daughter stay here until he can come  
pick her up. Did you need something, Luke?"

Luke shifted uncomfortably and edged further into the room. "I wanted  
to get a couple of more blankets for the guest room, but they're not  
in the cupboard."

Sarah Jane smiled. "They're in the laundry room, on the dryer."

Luke beat a rather hasty retreat to the other room, but still heard  
Mum's comment of, "It's not very likely that either of them are  
thinking of. . .what you think they're thinking of."

Luke took the blankets and went through the other door, back into the  
sitting room where Jenny was sitting on the couch reading a book.

She looked up and smiled – and he kind of wished his stomach wouldn't  
turn somersaults when she did that – sliding over enough so he could  
sit down next to her.

"I got some more blankets; the yellow room is really cold some times."

The yellow room was what he'd dubbed it after the incident involving  
some sulfur and vinegar. It was blue, really, but that was the room  
his Mum had told him to put Jenny in.

Jenny raised an eyebrow at him, but didn't ask.

He was rather grateful; he was stuck on his own thoughts, really. Not  
that she would mind if he said he didn't want to talk about it, but  
he'd feel bad. They tended to talk about everything.

Well, sort of, when they'd first met, she hadn't told him who her  
father was. But she'd pointed out later that she hadn't known it was  
relevant.

"I can't exactly walk around Earth asking people if they've met a man  
called The Doctor."

Mum said she probably could. There were more people who knew of him  
than you would expect.

She also said that they should have realized sooner that something  
wasn't quite right. Had it not been for Captain Jack and Martha  
stopping by and Martha getting very excited to see Jenny, they would  
never have known.

Jack said it was terribly obvious once you knew who her father was . .  
. who her father was.

Luke took his word for it, his interaction with The Doctor was very  
limited and it wasn't like Mum talked about him much.

He'd always been curious about this man whom his Mum was so terribly  
fond of. But Luke had suddenly found himself dreading the encounter  
when Martha had called The Doctor back to Earth with the statement,  
"There's someone here you have to see."

He'd almost hoped that The Doctor wouldn't show up. But he had. And  
while Luke had been happy for Jenny's sake, he'd selfishly hoped that  
something would detain The Doctor.

Sarah Jane had wrapped an arm supportively around his shoulders as  
Jenny and The Doctor had made plans for their first adventure.

And then Martha had been at the door, something about some crisis or  
other, Luke hadn't been able to focus because all he could see was the  
look on Jenny's face; the look that told him when the exact moment was  
that all of her dreams and plans crumbled around her. Luke just wanted  
to hug her.

She'd argued. "I can help!" but The Doctor had shook his head.

"No. Not this time. I know you can, but I'd rather not be worried  
about you while I have to worry about Martha and Jack too." She'd  
opened her mouth to protest and he'd cut her off. "I'll be back as  
soon as possible." He'd looked at Sarah Jane over her head.

"You can stay with us until he gets back." Sarah Jane had continued  
holding onto Luke, actually squeezing harder than was necessary.

The upshot had been that Jenny was being placed in a guest room  
instead of going back to her ship, which had been her initial plan.

Jenny laid the book down carefully on the arm of the couch, folding  
her legs under her and turning so she could look at him properly.

"Are you alright?"

Luke smiled and shrugged. "Yeah. I'm just thinking about something."

She looked at him in that considering way that made him immensely uncomfortable.

"I'll be back, you know. Dad comes back to Earth all the time. That's  
how I kept ending up here in the first place."

Of course he knew that. It didn't make him feel much better though.  
He'd sort of started taking for granted that she was around. She'd  
been popping in and out for so long that it had never occurred to him  
she might not.

It had really just been a series of random encounters, bumping into  
her – literally – in a store, the arcade or some restaurant and they'd  
started up a vague sort of friendship. Not to say she wasn't fond of  
Maria and Clyde as well, but Luke had noticed very quickly that she  
tended to talk to him more.

And she had always been very easy to talk to. They shared the same  
sorts of thought processes. She'd tried to pass off as being from  
Earth, but it was obvious that despite her accent, this wasn't the  
case. She knew too much about things – stars, planets, galaxies,  
understanding of processes no normal human being could comprehend; she  
didn't know enough of the things that she should have known about  
modern day Earth. She had no idea who Britney Spears was, she'd never  
had chips and she'd always had a politely puzzled look when Clyde  
tried to flirt with her.

Maria had said to Luke, "it's like talking to a female version of you".

"She's got an English accent, though," Clyde had pointed out.

Which, now that he thought about it, if she'd been cloned from The  
Doctor, if he and his friends were the first ones she had contact  
with, then she would have picked up their speech patterns.

In that same way he'd picked up Maria's.

They were similar in ways he shouldn't be similar to someone.

She'd started stopping by the house to seek him out whenever she was  
around. Sarah Jane had been very cautious in letting him spend time  
around Jenny at first, stating that "you don't know enough about her"  
and had insisted that if she couldn't be around, then they had to make  
sure Alan or at least Maria or Clyde were. And "don't tell her  
anything too personal. The whole thing is just too weird!"

Alan had said that would start to put a damper on Luke's love life as  
he got older.

He wasn't entirely sure why it was being made into such a big deal.  
Even Maria had started behaving strangely after awhile. Not much had  
changed, really. He liked spending time with Jenny, but it wasn't all  
that different than spending time with Maria.

Well, no. That wasn't true, it was completely different from spending  
time with Maria, but he didn't know how else to explain it except that  
it was. He felt. . .different about Jenny than he did Maria. But he  
didn't know exactly what he was meant to do about it.

Maria had an idea. Luke actually suspected it was just an excuse for  
her to talk to Michael Wexler, but she'd insisted. "I'll invite  
Michael, and Clyde can take Hannah and you and Jenny can come and  
we'll go see a movie. It'll be fun!"

So, they'd gone to the movies to see some musical based on ABBA (he'd  
had to ask Mum exactly what ABBA was). It seemed no one else had  
enjoyed themselves. Maria was annoyed because Michael had ignored her  
most of the time. He'd tried to flirt with Jenny maybe twice, before  
she'd specifically wrapped her arm through Luke's and glared at him.  
Maria said later she'd been hoping Jenny would punch him.

Clyde and Hannah hadn't fared any better except no one was flirting  
with anyone else. Luke wasn't sure what Hannah had done, but Clyde was  
embarrassed. He'd actually declared, "I'm never going anywhere in  
public with you again." It seemed to stem from Hannah's singing along  
with the music in the movie.

He'd liked the movie, although Jenny had said, "I think they should  
have given the men better songs to sing." She'd burst out laughing  
every time Pierce Brosnan had started singing.

He'd mostly been fond of the moment when halfway through the movie  
Jenny had reached out to take hold of his hand, shifting her weight  
around to where she was leaning more against him than the seat. She'd  
continued to hang on when they left the theater and gone for chips and  
shakes, sliding into the booth next to him without commenting on it.

After they'd left Hannah and Michael at their respective houses, Clyde  
had said to Luke, "at least someone enjoyed themselves".

He had. And it seemed Jenny had too, if the amount of conversation  
that had come later was any indication. She did ask later, "Why  
couldn't they just talk about what was going on? I don't see why they  
had to sing everything."

"I think it's that they feel so strongly just talking about it  
wouldn't work." He'd been about to use the example that since he'd met  
her all those soppy songs on the radio suddenly made sense. But he  
didn't know how to word that correctly and thought it would be sharing  
too much, so he made a note to show her the book Maria had on musical  
theater and left it at that.

By then they were standing on the front porch of his house, he did  
remember wondering why the porch light wasn't on. Mum always left it  
on when she knew he'd be out after dark.

But at the time it had seemed such a small matter, not really that  
peculiar. Mostly he'd been concerned by the way Jenny was still  
holding onto him. She'd smiled then and he'd suddenly been possessed  
with the intense desire to kiss her. Not that it was the first time  
he'd had the desire to do so, but this time it felt much stronger.

Jenny had tipped her head to the side to look at him before he felt  
her fingers moving up the back of his neck to twine into his hair. She  
tugged his head down slightly to close her lips over his.

Luke had a brief moment of absurd thought when he considered he should  
have asked about this earlier. But his hands found their way to her  
waist on their own and his mouth seemed to know what to do as well, so  
he let himself get on with it.

He understood why people treated kissing as such a big deal. On the  
list of amazing experiences he'd had in his somewhat brief life, this  
was pretty high on the list; right up there with chocolate and reading  
books.

They only pulled away from each other when the need for oxygen became  
important. Jenny smiled again. "If I'd waited for you, we would have  
been here all night."

Luke returned the smile and leaned forward to kiss her again when the  
porch light snapped on, Martha and Captain Harkness came out the front  
door and suddenly things became very loud and very confusing.

That had been HOURS ago. Maybe days. It was coming well on four  
o'clock in the morning.

And Jenny was still staring at him as if she expected a response. He  
realized she'd said something and he'd not heard her.

"What?"

"I said I'm sorry I didn't tell you about my Dad earlier. I just  
didn't think it was that relevant. It didn't seem wise to go around  
telling people I was a force-grown clone." She paused then. "You  
didn't tell me about you either."

The explanation that he was the Bane's archetype wasn't something you  
just blurted out in conversation.

Although Mum had done exactly that when The Doctor had asked who Luke  
was. Alan had asked if that had been wise, he'd come into the house in  
the middle of the pandemonium to return something he'd borrowed from  
them. Well, that's what he was supposed to tell them. Maria had  
actually heard a lot of yelling and had sent him to find out what it  
was.

Which was why he was still sitting in the kitchen hours after  
everything had calmed down; It seemed that Martha and Jack had come to  
Sarah Jane specifically because there'd been some disturbance in. .  
.something, honestly, he hadn't been listening by then. He'd not cared  
WHY they were there; he just suddenly wanted them gone. They'd needed  
Mum's help, but all he cared about was that they were immensely  
interested in Jenny.

And Jenny had been terribly excited to see Martha, although she'd  
sounded more concerned about where Donna was.

"Is she still with Dad? If you're not with him, does that mean she's  
not with him?"

Martha had frowned. "I'm not the one to explain that to you." She'd  
then gotten her cell phone and called The Doctor.

And things became even more chaotic.

Until now, the silence in the house was almost loud. But they were  
alone for the first time since the porch and Luke didn't really know  
how to act now.

Which again was why he'd wanted to talk to Alan. It may have been  
selfish to be thinking of such things now, but it seemed more  
important than ever to make sure she knew exactly how he felt.  
Especially as she was about to go wandering out into time and space  
and he wouldn't see her for who knew how long.

"Okay, Jenny. You should come with me." Sarah Jane said, smiling.

Luke wanted to ask why it was suddenly okay for Jenny to be hanging  
around when it hadn't been a month ago, but Jenny squeezed his hand  
and followed Sarah Jane out of the room, hugging the blankets to her  
chest as she did so.

He made a beeline for the kitchen where Alan was standing up,  
preparing to leave.

"Alan, can I ask you a question?"

Alan glanced at the clock and then nodded somewhat helplessly. "I've  
been gone enough hours now, I don't think Maria's going to worry about  
a few more minutes."

"Great." Luke took a deep breath and then blurted out. "What's the  
difference between a girl who's your friend and a girlfriend?"

Alan sat back in his chair with a 'thump'.

"Um. . .I don't know. Does your Mum know you're asking this?" He  
gestured to the chair across from him.

Luke sat down. "No. I thought I'd ask you first."

"Okay." Alan rubbed his neck. "I don't know. Do you want to touch her?"

Luke blinked and stared. "Is that important?"

Alan sighed. "Yes, Luke." He paused again. "You do know about sex, right?"

Luke nodded. "Yeah. But I just think there should be more to it than  
that. Some of the stuff I saw on the internet didn't look all that  
comfortable. There has to be more than just the need to reproduce."

"Okay, for starters, your Mum needs to put up some better firewalls  
on the internet." Alan looked at him considering for a long moment.  
"You're talking about Jenny?"

Luke nodded wordlessly.

"I think in your case, the definition of the word isn't as important  
as the fact that the bond exists," Alan said. "Do you know anything  
about. . .her. . .about. . ." He let out an exasperated sigh. "You  
should really ask Sarah Jane about this. I don't know anything about  
her dad's physical. . ." He sighed again. "Do you know how they  
reproduce?"

"Is that important?"

Again there was the silence as Alan gave him that look. "Maybe not  
right now. But it will be later."

"But why? I mean, I want to be with her. I want to be with her all  
the time and I want to talk to her in ways I don't even talk to Maria  
or Mum. If I got that, I wouldn't be all that worried about whether or  
not I got to touch her."

"Well, you'll learn, Luke. You won't feel like that forever and if  
she's not going to be interested in such a thing, it might become an  
issue."

"But it should matter more that you care about the other person. I  
mean, if you care about them, then it means you should want to be with  
them in every way possible." Luke said slowly, "The emotions should be  
there first, right? You should be with someone you. . .someone you  
love."

"If you're very, very lucky." Alan leaned back further in his chair.  
"If you care about her then you should tell her. Although it's  
possible she already knows. She doesn't seem like the type to miss  
such a thing."

Luke thought that might actually make it easier. But he found he  
wasn't quite sure he liked the idea of her knowing how he felt if he  
didn't know how she did.

He would have asked more, but Sarah Jane walked into the room as he  
opened his mouth and he quickly shut it.

"Bed time for you too, Luke." Sarah Jane smiled as he hugged her.  
"She was ridiculously up for me shuffling her off to bed. She's been  
very good about eating and sleeping and doing all these things she has  
no need for. I don't remember ever seeing The Doctor eat or sleep  
because he had to."

Luke wondered if sex was one of those things that time lords did but  
didn't HAVE to, but didn't think he should ask his Mum about such a  
thing.

He said good night to Alan and shuffled off to his room. He poked his  
head into the yellow room where Jenny was laying on her back on the  
bed with her arms folded under her head, staring out the window at the  
stars.

She tipped her head up to look at him as he hovered in the doorway.

Luke smiled. "I wanted to say goodnight."

Jenny returned the smile. "Goodnight."

Luke hesitated in the doorway for a moment, and then said, "You won't  
leave before telling me, will you?"

Jenny sat up then. "Of course not. I won't go without saying goodbye."

Luke felt somewhat relieved. "Good."

He went into his room, shutting the door firmly behind him.

He stared out the window at the stars as well, listening for any sign  
of the TARDIS' return.

He didn't want to miss the opportunity to see her off.

He would still be awake at dawn when the unfamiliar churning sound  
came from the street outside.


End file.
